proposal: SDCC support

[talsegev]

Hi,

I recently found out that eclipse is missing support for SDCC.

In short SDCC is "Small Device C Compiler", AKA C compiler for most 8-bit MCU's.

My proposal is to add support for SDCC. I think It will be a nice addition for this plugin.

Regards,
Tal

[ilg-ul]

Thank you for taking the time to make suggestions to this project.

As far as I can see in the SDCC home page, it supports mostly 8-bit MCUs, which, in my opinion, are not exactly the future.

[talsegev]

Hi,

I'm amazed to find how different we see the market.

I'll start with what I think we do agree on;
A. eclipse-embed-cdt is for embedded MCUs
B. 8-bit MCUs are still MCUs
C. 8-bits are less than 16-bits which are less than 32-bits etc...

I invite you to google up "8 bit microprocessor market share" and see for your self why I'm so amazed to read your comment "not exactly the future". My thoughts are exactly the opposite from yours, I think the 8-bits MCUs are the future, especially in the IoT era where devices are disposable and not fixable.

Regards,
Tal

[ilg-ul]

If 8 bit is the future, then it won't take long for someone with a better vision than mine to step in and support de development of such a new feature. I personally don't have the resources to do it.

[flit]

From my experience working in the silicon industry for about 17 years with a focus on MCUs, 8-bit devices are most definitely not the future. The vast majority of 8-bit devices sold are old devices being sold into existing products. There is comparatively very little new R&D for 8- or 16-bit devices. A major reason is that the power/performance numbers makes 8-bit devices very unattractive for IoT and a lot of other markets, especially in advanced process nodes ("advanced" for MCUs being 40nm with flash, or 28nm without flash).

All that said, there will always be 8- and 16-bit devices available, just like you can still get 4-bit devices today.

[TommyMurphyTM1234]

A. eclipse-embed-cdt is for embedded MCUs

Pedantic point - we (Microsemi/Microchip), and I suspect others, successfully use the plugins to support our FPGA based soft IP CPU cores which are technically not MCUs. So don't necessarily presume that the target is a "fixed" (e.g. ASIC) MCU. :-)